Sunday, March 01, 2015

I was doing a bit of a clean up in my sewing room and came across some fabric I bought ages ago with the idea of making a dust cover for my (then) new sewing machine. I love that the fabric motifs include many of my hobbies; sewing, knitting, crochet, embroidery, and embellishing are all represented. There is even some quilting in there, but it's been years since I've done any of that.

I stopped what I was doing, right then and there, and started drafting out a pattern for the cover.

The machine came with a flimsy, plastic cover that I've been using up until now. The ho-hum plastic cover did fit well so I used the measurements to draft the pattern for the one sewn from novelty fabric.

I even included the little flap that covers the carry handle, but allows access should I need to move the machine.

And now with that done I suppose I should really go back into the sewing room and continue the tidying? ---- Nahhh, that can wait. I'd rather get back to drafting a bodice sloper I was working on. The equipment from that is taking up a corner of the kitchen table and I'd like to get it cleared away.

There is also the cowl I've got about 80% knitted, the doll sweater that is half knit, and the wool rainbow warp waiting to be retied on the loom and worked on.

Tuesday, February 24, 2015

My old purse was wearing out and I couldn't find another that I really liked so I sewed up this little one using "The Nearly Tote-All Purse-O-Nality" pattern from Palm Harbor Patterns.

It measures ll.5"W x 8" H x 2.5" D, and has 5 exterior pockets (4 between the inner and outer purse, and one patch pocket), and two small patch pockets inside.

My thought had been to maybe use the pattern to make Saori purses, but there is WAY too much work in one to ever make them to sell. It took me the better part of three days to sew up!

This little purse pattern is incredibly well designed. Both the inner and outer purse sections are completely lined and have a layer of quilt batting. The inner purse also has a layer of heavy duty interfacing making this purse much sturdier than many home sewn bags of it's type.

I don't love it, but I do like it well enough to use it until such time that I find a purse that I do well and truly love.

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

I'm not sure where this is headed. I have six yards to play with and I intend to experiment and have fun. Hopefully in the end at least one section will be worthy of fulfilling the warp's original intent which is to be a colourful garden banner.

My initial experiments are not shown. They turned out so poorly that I unwove them and started again. I have discovered that my sett is a little too loose to show the pretty warp colours nicely without using great care in placing the weft, and the weft itself needs to be very fine or it completely obscures the rainbow warp.

So my plan at this point (subject to change as my creative muse guides me) is to weave about 32" of this very loose, gauzy effect, then cut it off, resley the reed with a closer sett, and carry on experimenting. I figure a closer sett will give me more weft options.

In the meantime I'll continue on weaving as I am now for the planned 32". I'll see how that looks off the loom. Because it is so loosely woven it might have a tendency to collapse and become "sleazy". If that happens it may be subjected to some experimental felting. When that is done I might decide to add interest with some surface embellishing.

This semi-transparent effect is being achieved by using one black wool weft strand, that is about equal in thickness to the coloured warp strands, alternating with a very, very, fine silver thread. I'm hoping the silver strand will sparkle in the sun when the weaving is hung in the garden.

Tuesday, February 17, 2015

---will hopefully play nicely together and become a Rainbow banner for my garden. I use the term "garden" rather loosely here. I realize that a few tulips gathered around an apple tree does not a garden make. I'm no garderner. Work with me here, m'kay? At least the banner will bring some colour to the mud and grass back there.

I wanted the warp to retain the same colour progression as the yarn did in the balls, but wasn't sure how to go about that. The traditional method of winding a warp has you going down, reversing, and coming back up again measuring each warp strand. That wouldn't work for my purpose because it would reverse each warp strand and interrupt the perfect colour progression.

Enter the wonders of the Internet and online forum friends. I asked for a brainstorming session on this problem and less than 24 hours later someone came up with the solution! They suggested that I measure the warp in a complete circle, and they even pointed me in the direction of a tutorial. The tutorial was written for hand painted skeins being prepared for faux ikat, but it works equally well for any interesting yarn that you want to preserve the colour sequence of. I immediately pinned the tutorial to my Pinterest board so I wouldn't lose it!

I really only need a finished woven length of 29 inches, but that made the colour progression far too slow. I would have only gone through three or four colours before I arrived at the full 14 inch width I was aiming for. So I lengthened my measuring path to a full 6 yards, LOL. My plan is to weave the whole thing off and then decide what section I want to keep for the banner. The rest will likely become part of some sewing project or another at some time. This is feltable wool, so that might be an option too.

For the non-weaving blog readers I just want to point out that the section you see woven in the last picture is NOT part of the final weaving. This is what is called a "header", and it is just scrap fabric that I will pull out later. A header is used to quickly align the individual warp threads so that they are all parallel and ready for weaving.

Thursday, February 12, 2015

On the one hand I LOVE the colour. Wearing vibrant, bold colours makes me feel happy and alive.

But I’m not happy with the way that front hem is hanging. The Right
front is sagging a little. I think it’s in part due to the relatively
loose weave. I should have backed the entire thing with fusible
interfacing to give it more stability.

I also didn't intend for the “hairy-ness” to be so prominent. It’s
because one of the fur yarns is white. The places where it is pink,
blue, or black I actually like.

LOVE the way a bit of Saori weaving peeks out of the back box pleat.

Not so in love with the way it fits me. Even though I chose a size
smaller than my measurements indicated was necessary (because I’m
successfully dieting and anticipate being smaller by far in a few
months), the jacket is rather large on me even now. I won’t get much
wear out of it before it’s uncomfortably loose on me.